International border crossings to and from the United States and Canada and Mexico exceed 350,000,000 crossings per year. It is no surprise to those with family, friends, and work on both sides of an international border that delays can result in crossing times in excess of one hour for both vehicular and pedestrian traffic. Thus, there is a need for access to accurate and up-to-date border crossing conditions that would assist in the decision making process of when and where to cross an international border.
There exist a number of options available for obtaining vehicular and pedestrian traffic conditions. Television and radio stations typically report major highway and interstate traffic conditions but in the case of international border crossings, such reports usually occur only when there are excessive delays as a result of a reportable event. Likewise, websites and computer applications typically provide still shots or animated depictions of traffic conditions with color gradations indicating an estimate of the then current traffic flow. The information provided by these methods does not inform the user of the actual flow of vehicular and pedestrian traffic, data which is essential to determining the actual congestion and speed at which the traffic is flowing.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,739,332 to Patton et al. is directed to a system and method for providing users live streaming video of traffic conditions from a plurality of cameras. The system and method employs image cache memories to reduce latency in providing the user requested video. Because this system and method is streaming live video, the bandwidth, server requirements, and costs for maintaining such a system can be prohibitive. In addition, streaming video is inherently problematic suffering from delayed starts, poor video quality, and long buffering interruptions. Streaming video systems must process incoming video every hour of every day and requires one extra bandwidth internet connection per shot per camera. Thus, each camera is a separate process with its own Internet Service Provider (ISP) fees.
Alternatively, commonly known surveillance video systems are widely available to provide live or recorded video images. These systems typically require video recording software that must record video 24 hours a day 7 days a week leading to potential disc problems at the remote server over time. Because the surveillance video system requires video recording software, implementation of the system and method of the present disclosure would necessitate functionality with the recording software leading to lengthy processing times and increased resource requirements. A need therefore exists for a reliable and affordable system for providing users near real-time video footage of current conditions.